American-Manifesto.com In Defense of American Exceptionalism

Yet another Philly cop was shot and killed on Friday night.  We’ll soon be treated to more calls for gun control by people who want more government control of pretty much everything.  They’ll try to argue that if we just restrict the rights of legal owners, then fewer guns will flow through the black market and into the hands of criminals.

That might sound plausible if you don’t study the subject, but for those of us who do it is, at best, hopelessly naive.  The real world evidence doesn’t support that conclusion.  In fact, the opposite is demonstrated.

But the usual pattern will probably hold true.  It’s familiar to those of us who pay attention:

1. Police officer is shot.
2. Suspect has long and increasingly violent criminal history beginning in his early teens.
3. Media pays lip service to his criminal history and focuses on guns instead.

But if guns are the problem, why is Philadelphia so uniquely bloody in Pennsylvania?  Why don’t the suburbs or the hunter-filled rural areas have so many murders?  Because obviously guns are not the cause. 

Here’s a clue for the media.  Maybe they should take a look at the cultural, political and judicial setting in Philadelphia.  The rest of us figured that out a long time ago.